Warminster is a market town and successful market towns have a good network of roads bringing traders to the town. Roads have existed for as long as it was desirable to get from one fixed place to another and the concept of the King’s Highway developed.
The King’s Highway was the right of the King and all his subjects to travel from one place to another. The usual method for getting from one place to another would be along the easiest route, so this route became the road. There could be two roads from one place to another. The easier one may have become impassable in wet conditions, so there would sometimes be an alternative, taking a slightly higher way.
The King’s Highway really was a right. If the way was flooded, or impassable for some other reason, then the traveller had the right to walk upon the corn – not popular with farmers.
A successful market town will attract a lot of trade, and a lot of trade would have put a great strain on early roads because most traders would come to market with a horse and a loaded cart. The Romans built good roads when they were in Britain, but these were mainly roads between one important Roman place and another. They were not too interested in getting from Westbury to Warminster, but market traders are interested, and they want to get to Warminster from a lot of other places as well.
Primitive roads could not handle busy traffic and, as traders’ carts became heavier, the situation got ever worse. Something must be done!
No-one is going to build a fine highway and keep it in good condition out of the goodness of his or her heart. Improving things is going to cost money and anybody investing in a new road will charge people who use it. Nobody would be rich enough to provide a useful network so, when it became obvious that the roads had to be improved, groups of funders were formed. These were the Turnpike Trusts, and it was the birth of the turnpike roads.
Warminster’s first turnpike roads were authorized by Act of Parliament in 1722 during the reign of King George I. Travelers paid to use these roads, and the toll was based on the type of traffic and the likely strain that the vehicle or animals would inflict on the road surface. The tolls were collected at the toll gates and there was usually a small building to house the toll collector, next to the toll gate. Some of these toll houses still exist in and around Warminster.
Paying your toll to travel on the section of the road which led to Warminster town, entitled you to spend the day in Warminster, without having to pay again for using Warminster roads when you left the town. Stay overnight and you would be charged for using the section of road from Warminster to the toll gate, so you would be paying twice. If you left before midnight on the day of arrival, you would pay only once. What this led to on market day was a long trail of carts at the toll gates, waiting for midnight, so that they could get an early start at the market without paying again when they left the town on Market Day.
Turnpikes did not prove to be a great money-spinner. Traffic increased as population increased, carts were bigger and heavier, and the road surface required constant attention. And you always had to trust the toll collector, of course.
